


Prefaces to the 2014 editions of the Melly Lake and Sadie Smith series

by hhertzof



Category: BETTANY Josephine M. - Works, SMITH Sarah Jane - Works, WILLIAMS Amelia - Works
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-10
Updated: 2014-03-10
Packaged: 2018-01-15 06:05:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 2,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1294159
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hhertzof/pseuds/hhertzof
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prefaces to the recently announced reprintings of the Melly and Sadie series (the Time series).</p><p>The <em>Melly Lake and Sadie Smith</em> series (also known as the Time series)<br/>By Amelia Williams<br/><em>Time Enough</em> 1959<br/><em>Twice Upon a Time</em> 1960<br/><em>Times Past</em> 1966<br/><em>A Stitch in Time</em> 1968<br/><em>Closing Time</em> 1974</p><p>By Sarah Jane Smith<br/><em>Second Time Around</em> 2014</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Preface to the 2014 edition of Time Enough by Amelia Williams.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [pocketmouse](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pocketmouse/gifts).



> As hopeful as I was that we might learn more about the origins of the Melly and Sadie series, Ms. Smith has a bad habit of insisting that the fictional account is much more interesting than the reality and refusing to go into detail. Disappointing, I know. However, she does acknowledge that she was the inspiration for "Sadie" Smith, and while she claims that "Melly" was based on a friend of Ms. Williams', it may well be an abbreviation of Amelia. Perhaps digging up Ms. Smith's long out-of-print SF novels may shed some light on the subject. She also mentions a Josephine M. Bettany book in the preface to _Times Past_ \- it might be worth comparing the two accounts of the archaeological dig.

Whilst _Summer Falls_ has stayed in print continuously since it was first published, the _Melly Lake and Sadie Smith_ series has not been so fortunate. Some of you might have picked up a tatty copy of _A Stitch in Time_ at a charity shop, or read and reread your mum's or dad's old copies, or perhaps you are new to the time travelling adventures of Melly Lake and Sadie Smith.

When her publisher announced that they would be re-releasing the books it caused a stir among the devoted fans of her work, not least because they mentioned that they would be bringing in a new author to write new adventures. An author who was better known for her journalism than for her long out-of-print SF novels. All the publisher knew was that this had been written into her original 1959 contract. I was eight at the time. 

My aunt, Lavinia Smith, had accepted a visiting professorship at Columbia University in New York City and Amy and her husband and son, lived on the floor above us in an old Brownstone row house that had been converted into flats, or as the Americans say, apartments, very similar to the one the girls live in in the books. In fact, Nina Evers' based her illustrations on photos of that very building (there's a good picture of the outside in chapter 3).

Aunt Lavinia arranged for Amy to look after me after school. Her son, Anthony, was five years older than me, and usually went out with his friends after school. It wasn't the best of arrangements as Amy was just at the start of her next book and I was still adjusting to my American school, but we made do. I'd sit at her kitchen table and do my homework whilst she attempted to start her next novel, discarding multiple attempts that weren't quite right. We sat there for weeks, each focused on our own tasks and not talking much to each other unless Anthony was around and even then, they'd talk and I'd focus on my school work. This situation might have continued on indefinitely if not for the manuscript page which I found in a secret compartment in the floor of my bedroom, . I don't know why I showed it to her, but she showed it to an archaeologist friend of hers and we spent the next few weeks trying to figure out where it came from.

I'd tell the entire story, but the tale we wove out of that old manuscript is much more interesting than the hours we spent digging through card catalogues and old books and there was much less time travel involved. Trust me, you'd much rather read about Melly and Sadie's adventures travelling through time to unravel a prophecy and save the world. You'll get to meet the mysterious Curator (or meet him again if you've read _Summer Falls_ ) and learn some of his secrets.

And for those of you who are already fans of the series, trust me. I was there at the beginning and I know where (and when) Melly and Sadie (and the Curator) are headed next.

Sarah Jane Smith,  
Bannerman Road, 2014


	2. Preface to the 2014 edition of Twice Upon a Time by Amelia Williams.

Preface to the 2014 edition of _Twice Upon a Time_ by Amelia Williams.

Welcome back. If you've got this far, I hope you've already read _Time Enough_ and you know all about how Sadie found that manuscript under her bedroom floorboard, how she and Melly met the mysterious Curator, and how the three of them tried to figure out the prophecy and save the world. If not you might want to go back and pick up a copy of _Time Enough_ right now.

When last we met, I told you how I discovered a similar manuscript under the floorboard of my bedroom in the old Brownstone I was living in in New York City and how I showed it to Amy (Amelia Williams to you) and she showed it to her archaeologist friend, which led us on a chase through archives and libraries to find out more. Sadly, while we met some lovely curators along the way, none of them were as familiar with time travel as the one in the books.

I won't say I was bored - I wasn't, but it doesn't make for an exciting story. I said as much to Amy afterwards, as I tried to turn it into an essay for school, and she looked at me across the kitchen table. "If it were a story, what would you _want_ the manuscript to be?"

"Magical. A real prophecy," I replied. "Like the Nesbit books or Narnia. With daring escapes and people fighting over it."

"Do you like time travel?" she asked. Amy studied me for a minute. "Do you want to be in one of my books? I was going to make this a solo adventure based on another girl I know, but I think it might be better with two heroines."

And that is how Melly Lake gained a friend in Sadie Smith.

By the time Amy started writing _Twice Upon a Time_ , Aunt Lavinia and I had moved back to England, but Amy and I kept up a correspondence until her death and many plot points were worked out via letter. It was a slow process, as we didn't have email in those days, so each letter had to cross the Atlantic Ocean before it could be read. We managed though, and you hold the result in your hands.

In this book Melly and Sadie are taken back in time by the Curator to the Italian Renaissance where they meet both Leonardo da Vinci and the author of the manuscript, Duke Giuliano, before the evil Quiets attack and send them racing through time to stop history from imploding. Much more exciting than dusty archives and card catalogues, I can assure you.

Sarah Jane Smith  
Bannerman Road, 2014


	3. Preface to the 2014 edition of Times Past by Amelia Williams.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All you really need to know about the Chalet School references: Book series by Elinor M. Brent-Dyer. Josephine M. Bettany is a character in the books also known for novelising "real" events, Jem Maynard is her husband and a doctor specialising in TB. Mary-Lou Trelawny is a former pupil who becomes an archaeologist. The parallel was too good to pass up.

When last we left our heroines, Sadie had been trapped in Duke Giuliano's time, while Melly and the Lone Centurion had escaped to the 51st century to request assistance from the Curator's people and the Curator himself is nowhere to be found. And the prophecy has started coming true.

It was six years before Amy wrote another Melly and Sadie adventure. In between, she wrote the Star duet, _Wishing Star_ and _Falling Star_ , while we busily exchanged letters trying to figure out how we were going to get everyone out of trouble.

By this point, I was at the Chalet School in Switzerland, whilst Aunt Lavinia worked with Jem Maynard on a potential cure for TB. This slowed our letters down even further, but also finally gave us the key to rescuing Melly and Sadie. (If you want to find out how, skip the rest of this preface and start reading the story. I'm not telling.)

I will say that that was the term that there was a big archaeological find in a cave near our school and that figures prominently in the story you are about to read. Amy's archaeologist friend, Dr Song showed up there, along with many other prominent archaeologists and it's been written about in many scholarly journals, as well as being featured in Josephine M. Bettany's _Fifth Form Treasure Hunt_.

As with the other books, the reality was not quite as interesting as the story. As I recall, we barely had anything to do with the dig beyond waiting eagerly for titbits from Dr Song or Professor Summerfield or one of the other archaeologists involved in the dig. You'll have a much more interesting time reading the book than listening to me ramble.

Sarah Jane Smith  
Bannerman Road, 2014


	4. Preface to the 2014 edition of A Stitch in Time by Amelia Williams.

Another two years passed before the next Melly and Sadie book appeared. Aunt Lavinia finished her work in Switzerland, but I insisted on staying on at the Chalet School. I only had a term or two left and I didn't see the point in changing schools again. It was odd, not being able to run up to see her at the weekend, but it's very hard to be lonely in a boarding school.

Amy and I had believed that we'd finished the Melly and Sadie books with _Times Past_. The Quiets were defeated, the world was safe and the girls had returned home to their normal lives. Trilogies were more common in those days than long sprawling series, but then I got a letter from Amy saying "What if?". What if the prophecy didn't mean what they thought it meant? What if the world was still in danger from another evil? What if the Curator was gone, but they had an adventure without him using what they'd learnt to save the day? And I wrote back with more questions about Johnny and Vis and Tegan and Nyssa. 

And so began the story of how Melly and Sadie found a crack in the fabric of time and had to figure out how to close it all on their own.

I should point out that all five of the original books were written by Amelia. My job was mostly brainstorming and what young fans today call a beta reader. I'd throw out ideas and she'd work them in or not depending on whether they fit in with the story she was telling, and then I'd read the manuscript before anyone else (except perhaps her husband), and let her know what I thought. I thought this one was smashing, and I think you will too.

Sarah Jane Smith  
Bannerman Road, 2014


	5. Preface to the 2014 edition of Closing Time by Amelia Williams.

Here we are at the end of the original Melly and Sadie books, completing the adventure started in _A Stitch in Time_.

In the last preface I described how this story came about - how we thought we'd finished Melly and Sadie's adventures, but just kept coming up with more possibilities. This was originally supposed to be just one book, but it was one of those stories that just grew and grew. Eventually, Amy split off the first half in order to meet the deadline, promising her editor the second half once she'd completed a couple of other books she had under contract ( _Pandora's Box_ and _Night Thief of Ill-Harbour_ ).

In this last book, Amy explores what it is to have a destiny, whether you choose to accept or reject it and what it might mean for the fate of the universe. We don't get to see our potential futures as closely as Melly and Sadie do, but I was finishing university just as this book was being written and my letters were full of the same sort of questions as Melly and Sadie were struggling with. Where do I go from here? Is this really what I want to do with my life?

The answers I found then were valid then, though my life has gone through plenty of unexpected twists and turns in the past 40 years. And the choices Melly and Sadie make at the end of this book will lead them on a path I couldn't have imagined at 18 or 21. I look forward to seeing where they go next and I hope you do too.

Sarah Jane Smith  
Bannerman Road, 2014


	6. Preface to the 2014 edition of Second Time Around by Sarah Jane Smith.

The catch to writing a new volume in an established series is that there is no way you will please everyone. Some of you (the ones who have read and reread the five original Amelia Williams novels) may say that my writing is inferior, that I don't know the characters or love them as well as you do, that Melly and Sadie say or do things in this book that are out of character, and that's okay. I'm giving you permission to not like this book. 

I've discussed in the prefaces to the original Melly and Sadie books why Amelia Williams insisted that I be the one to continue the series, if it went on after her death, but I'll summarise it here. We met when we were living in the same Brownstone (split up into flats) in New York City, and as we got to know each other, she decided what her new book needed was a new character, based on me. Even after I left New York for school, first in England and then in Switzerland, we kept up a correspondence and I remained one of the first readers of her Melly and Sadie books. Events at my school in Switzerland even inspired _Times Past_.

After _Closing Time_ , we sometimes discussed the possibility of a new Melly and Sadie book, but we couldn't settle on a plot and meanwhile, I'd started my career as a journalist and letters might take weeks or months to arrive, depending on where I was at the time. Somehow time slipped away from us both, the books went out of print and it looked unlikely that they would ever come back.

By the time she passed away, we'd both moved on to other things. I kept in touch with her son, but life had brought other challenges, so when Anthony called me to say that they were interested in bringing these books back and ask if I'd be interested in writing a new trilogy, I told him I had to think about it. I dug out my own copies and by the time I'd finished rereading them, I knew that Melly and Sadie had more adventures ahead of them.

Sarah Jane Smith  
Bannerman Road, 2014


End file.
